The Film:
Action movies will always appear in movie theatres as long as there are
young boys and men who never quite grow up. I’m not disparaging the
action-movie demographic as I readily admit that I enjoy shoot-‘em-ups
as much as anyone else. However, lately, most action movies are crosses
with other genres like science fiction (The Matrix), spy
thrillers (the James Bond franchise), capers (The Italian Job),
and even comedy (Mr. & Mrs. Smith). Straight-up action has been
largely relegated to the straight-to-video bin, where names like Steven
Seagal, Tom Berenger (Oscar nominated!), and Wesley Snipes appear
regularly.

2007’s Shooter is a return to respectable pure action--there’s no
time-traveling, no espionage, no boosting, no joke-telling. Everyone
plays it for “real” without winking at the audience. Mark Wahlberg has
come a long way as an actor, and even though his role in this movie
doesn’t challenge him much, he is a believable presence.

Wahlberg plays Bobby Lee Swagger, a retired Marine sniper who is framed
by shadowy government figures for the assassination of an Ethiopian
archbishop. Swagger goes on the run in order to clear his name and to
uncover the conspiracy. Shooter avoids asking the audience to
suspend too much disbelief by avoiding making Swagger a one-man army;
Swagger is aided by a marginalized FBI agent and his best-friend’s
widow. The script efficiently reveals exposition in a handful of brief
conversations. Otherwise, you get a series of well-executed tense,
adrenaline-pumping set pieces.

Unfortunately, the moviemakers took themselves a little too seriously
and let a few scenes play beyond necessary marks. At the end, you have
to sit through a distended shoot-out even though you know exactly would
happen when you get a righteous vigilante taking on immoral
capitalists. This is really the only weak point of an otherwise solid
red-meat flick.

Video:

The 2.35:1 1080p picture is rather drab and dark, though one can’t
complain too much about an intentionally low-key style. This is true
even of scenes not set in wintry/snowy settings. Whereas the SD-DVD’s
video transfer is a tad soft and lacking in detail, the HD-DVD offers
markedly improved picture image quality. You can clearly see insects
flying in the background during the first half of the movie when Mark
Wahlberg is outside his mountain cabin, and faraway objects are no
longer indistinguishable black dots.

Audio:

Shooter
is about snipers, so the Dolby Digital Plus 5.1 English track is not
a continuous cacophony of multi-directional booms. There are plenty
of sound effects whizzing across the room, but they are mostly of
single bullets being fired with care and precision. In fact, there
are times when rear-channel activity is courtesy mainly of the music
score. However, there are impressive helicopter fly-bys, and when
Swagger booby-traps a ranch with pipe bombs and napalm, you will be
immersed in pure devastation and immolation. The HD-DVD’s audio
sounds a bit fuller and richer than the SD-DVD’s, but this is simply
an enhanced experience rather than a completely new one.

You can also watch the movie with DD Plus 5.1 French and DD Plus 5.1
Spanish dubs. Optional English, English SDH, French, and Spanish
subtitles support the audio.

Extras:

Director Antoine Fuqua contributed an audio commentary; Fuqua hews
mostly to the technical aspects of moviemaking, so the commentary
will be of interest mostly to people who already have some knowledge
of mounting a physically-complex production.

Next up are seven deleted scenes. Some of these are fairly amusing,
though they would’ve prolonged an already overly-long movie.

“Survival of the Fittest: The Making of Shooter” is a
run-of-the-mill overview of the production. Though less of a
hard-sell than most featurettes, you still get talking-heads
interviews with people who think that they’ve made a masterpiece.

The “Independence Hall” featurette teaches viewers about some
aspects of American history.